Hurricane Rita

Though apprehensions about a far greater damage and loss of lives have been reduced, the towns and their people hit by the hurricane are now facing the challenges of rebuilding their habitats. And it's not an easy task, both from the administration and community's point of view. Massive rescue operations are underway now, with military helicopters, coast guard boats and volunteers scouring the worst hit towns and fishing villages that have been cut off by floods.

Here we are forced to say that the US authorities did not seem to have learnt a lesson from post-Katrina period when failure to evacuate people to a safer place brought brickbats for them. Even this time, according to reports, more than 2,500 people were rescued from one parish alone while many more were saved from rooftops and trees in other areas. Why were they not taken to a safer place? We also witnessed the unbelievable scenes of long lines of cars with thousands of people stranded on the highways for lack of petrol. They did not know where to go, what to do in such dire circumstances. This kind of agony, chaos with no apparent help only underlines the system failure in the US to a considerable extent.

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And finally we would like to say that this should be the wake up call for the US to save the environment. As we all know, the US's reluctance to ratify the Kyoto protocol has come under severe criticism. May be time has come for them to rethink their strategies.